


five times wash fell in love with york

by runawayballista



Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, Genderbending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-20
Updated: 2013-07-20
Packaged: 2017-12-20 19:55:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,370
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/891212
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/runawayballista/pseuds/runawayballista
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>York has been a constant in Wash's life for longer than he can remember, sometimes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	five times wash fell in love with york

**Author's Note:**

> Set in a Wash/fem!York AU Larissa and I have been working on for some time in which York breaks Wash out of Project Freelancer after Epsilon's self-termination. This was supposed to be a birthday fic from a year ago, but I am the actual worst about deadlines.

**1**

Wash has never given much thought to love before. It was always there, in the background, a universal constant that he only ever saw from a distance, but he’d never been too concerned with looking for it. There were always more important things to focus on -- the war, for one. He supposes that he thought somewhere, dimly in the back of his mind, that he’d find it sooner or later.

He never thought it’d come crashing into him like a train going a hundred miles per hour, like a weight suddenly dropped into his chest. 

It’s when York rolls back against the bed with a breathless laugh, peeling her sticky skin away from his to occupy the narrow space on the bed that’s not taken up by Wash’s limply sprawling body. He tries to catch his breath, tries to reel in his hazy thoughts, but all he can manage to think about is how _warm_ she is next to him. He lets his head roll to the side, and he catches her in the middle of a laugh, half-stretching against him -- her hair is stuck to her cheeks and neck with sweat in places, her cheeks still flushed pink. She just _smiles_ at him with those kiss-bruised lips, uttering something in a quiet, hoarse voice about _guess I’m not all talk after all_ , and Wash feels the bottom drop out of his stomach.

 

**2**

Wash remembers it vividly. There are a lot of things he doesn’t -- Epsilon had muddled up so many of his memories, tangling his memory storage processes into an indiscernible mess, but this one, he remembers.

It’s the second the grenade goes off. He thinks for a second it’s just the sound of the explosion making his ears ring, but it’s not. It’s the way his chest seizes, the sound of his own heart thudding in his ears so loud he can’t hear anything else, because that’s _York’s_ body sprawling lifelessly over the training room floor, that’s _York’s_ helmet, cracked and smoking and he doesn’t even remember running down there, doesn’t remember the path his feet trace along with everybody else. He just remembers Carolina pulling him back before he can get too close, because _Wash, fall back, there’s nothing you can do, the medics need room_. He remembers this, the way his stomach lurches when the medics lift her onto the stretcher and her head lolls limply to the side, and he can hear them talking quietly about embedded shrapnel and reconstructive surgery and all he can think was _god please no you have to be okay_.

 

**3**

The night before his implantation, York finds him in the lounge, curled up on the couch and staring blankly at the projector screen they use for a television sometimes. He can’t sleep, and she doesn’t blame him -- she hadn’t exactly slept the night before she’d gotten Delta, either. She’d picked the lock on Wash’s door in the middle of the night, crawled right into bed with him without a word.

But Wash knows there was something self-assured about even that, about the way she’d just let herself in. He doesn’t have that -- he’s all nerves, and the best comfort he can come up with for himself is the empty lounge. But York sweeps in and takes him back to his bunk, all warm hands and murmured reassurances, ushering him into bed with the promise she’ll stay till morning, but it’s so much more than that. He’s tired -- he’s _exhausted_ , and when York draws him into her arms he feels his weary body sink right into the narrow mattress. She presses a kiss to his forehead and when he looks at her, really _looks_ at her, there’s a moment of deafening silence in his mind and he swears his heart stops, _everything_ stops, and there isn’t a doubt in his mind.

He tries to say it, tries to get the clumsy words past his lips even though his voice is little more than a tired croak. “Natalie, I...”

But she quiets him with the brush of her lips against his and the words die in his throat, and she just murmurs to him, quietly, “Save it for later, sugar. Let’s just sleep for now.” Wash lets her stroke her hand over the back of his head, lets her soothe him to sleep, but he knows there’s no rationing away the feeling that clouds up his chest.

 

**4**

Epsilon’s integration is a grueling struggle, an endless flood of memories that Wash is losing the ability to distinguish from his own. He was doing alright for a while, getting by, but Epsilon’s touch on his mind spreads like a virus, refusing to be contained. Sometimes when York speaks, all he hears is the rush of Texas wind in his ears. 

It’s the night before Epsilon finally destabilizes for good, but Wash has managed to push back the static that keeps trying to fill his mind for a little while, at least. Everyone knows Epsilon is a problem, now. Thanks to him, Wash has been suspended from missions until further notice, pending diagnostics on the AI.

But York’s there, murmuring reassurances, that they’ll get it all sorted out as soon as she gets back from what’s now going to be a solo mission. They’ll find a way to get the Director to take Epsilon out, she tells him, that it’ll be okay. She _promises_ , and Wash feels the awful warmth of hope lurch and rise in the back of his throat.

“You -- you keep your promises,” he mumbles, and he feels York shift to better curl her arms around his shoulders, pressing him tight to her chest.

“You’re damn right I do,” York says, and her voice creaks, but he knows she means it. He buries his face in her shoulder, breathing in deep the scent of her skin in the hopes it’ll seal itself in his memory. “You just gotta trust me.” 

Wash pulls back, words on his lips, but when he looks at her they just go numb. “I trust you,” he says, clumsily, but he thinks, _I love you_.

 

**5**

For a long time, Wash can’t remember who she is. They took Epsilon out, but they only took his chip. They couldn’t leech him away from every dark corner of Wash’s mind, couldn’t pull him out when he’d already buried himself in so deep that Wash can hardly tell what’s real anymore. Wash doesn’t remember much of anything these days, but he knows she’s real. Even without the light of recognition, he knows, every time he looks at her, that somehow, she’s important.

She takes care of him, he knows that much. She ushers him to bed every night with a tired smile, sliding an arm around his waist, so that when he wakes with a jolt, screaming himself hoarse, she’ll be there. She’s always there, and every time her face comes into focus it gets a little more familiar. He _remembers_ her. Because deep down, somewhere there’s a place in his mind that fills with warmth whenever she’s near -- somewhere deep inside him, he loves a woman he doesn’t fully know. All he knows is that she makes him feel safe, and when she leaves his sight, he worries she’ll never come back. 

But she always does. Little by little, things get to be more familiar. He comes to anticipate the hand on his arm, the way she gently speaks to him in the dark, soothing him to sleep. And he starts to recognize the smile on her face, the uneven crease of her bad eye, starts to remember how things were before. Here and there, a word from York’s mouth is a jolt, and he remembers another piece of himself. So much has changed, since they left, since Epsilon left Wash’s mind a fractured mess, since York hid him away from the Project, far from the Director’s reach. His entire _world_ has changed, no longer the cold metallic brush of the military, but something quiet and civilian with a waterfront view. But York hasn’t changed. York has always been a constant, and Wash has always fallen in love with her every time he looks at her.


End file.
